High availability failover manager

ABSTRACT

A high availability (HA) failover manager maintains data availability of one or more input/output (I/O) resources in a cluster by ensuring that each I/O resource is available (e.g., mounted) on a hosting node of the cluster and that each I/O resource may be available on one or more partner nodes of the cluster if a node (i.e., a local node) were to fail. The HA failover manager (HA manager) processes inputs from various sources of the cluster to determine whether failover is enabled for a local node and each partner node in an HA group, and for triggering failover of the I/O resources to the partner node as necessary. For each I/O resource, the HA manager may track state information including (i) a state of the I/O resource (e.g., mounted or un-mounted); (ii) the partner node(s) ability to service the I/O resource; and (iii) whether a non-volatile log recording I/O requests is synchronized to the partner node(s). The HA manager interacts with various layers of a storage I/O stack to mount and un-mount the I/O resources on one or more nodes of the cluster through the use of well-defined interfaces, e.g., application programming interfaces.

RELATED APPLICATION

The present application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 14/864,026, entitled High Availability Failover Manager, filed on Sep. 24, 2015 by Steven S. Watanabe et al., the contents of which are incorporated by reference herein in their entirety.

BACKGROUND Technical Field

The present disclosure relates to storage systems and, more specifically, to high performance and availability of data in a cluster of storage systems.

Background Information

A storage system typically includes one or more storage devices, such as solid state drives (SSDs) embodied as flash storage devices, into which information (i.e., data) may be entered, and from which data may be obtained, as desired. The storage system (i.e., node) may logically organize the data stored on the devices as storage containers, such as files and/or logical units (LUNs). To improve the performance and availability of the data contained in the storage containers, a plurality of nodes may be interconnected as a cluster configured to provide storage service relating to the organization of the storage containers and with the property that when one node fails another node may service data access requests, i.e., operations, directed to the failed node's storage containers. Such a “failover” may involve many different services that require interoperation (e.g., protocols, availability of recovery data) as well as identification and selection of a failover node (i.e., the node assuming service of the data access requests directed to the failed node). As a result, there is a need for coordination among the different services for a failover within a cluster.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The above and further advantages of the embodiments herein may be better understood by referring to the following description in conjunction with the accompanying drawings in which like reference numerals indicate identically or functionally similar elements, of which:

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a plurality of nodes interconnected as a cluster;

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of a node;

FIG. 3 is a block diagram of a storage input/output (I/O) stack of the node;

FIG. 4 illustrates a write path of the storage I/O stack;

FIG. 5 illustrates a read path of the storage I/O stack;

FIG. 6 illustrates a high availability (HA) partner arrangement in a multi-node cluster; and

FIG. 7 is a block diagram of a high data availability arrangement including a HA failover manager.

OVERVIEW

The embodiments herein provide a high availability (HA) failover manager configured to maintain data availability of one or more input/output (I/O) resources in a cluster by ensuring that each I/O resource is available (e.g., mounted) on a hosting node of the cluster and that each I/O resource may be available on one or more partner nodes of the cluster if a node (i.e., a local node) were to fail. As used herein, an I/O resource includes one or more volumes and/or extent stores of a storage I/O stack having a plurality of layers executing on each node of the cluster. The HA failover manager (HA manager) is configured to process inputs from various sources (e.g. clients, nodes) of the cluster to determine whether failover is enabled for a local node (i.e., active node servicing the I/O resource) and each partner node in an HA group, and for triggering failover of the I/O resources to the partner node as necessary. For each I/O resource, the HA manager may track state information including (i) a state of the I/O resource (e.g., mounted or un-mounted); (ii) the partner node(s) ability to service (i.e., capability of mounting) the I/O resource; and (iii) whether a non-volatile log recording I/O requests, e.g., non-volatile random access memory (NVRAM), is synchronized to the partner node(s).

In an embodiment, the state information is stored in an I/O resource table of a cluster wide database (CDB) that is maintained by a cluster consensus manager and provides transaction semantics that guarantee ordering and consistency across the nodes of the cluster. The HA manager is illustratively a cluster-wide component that includes a plurality of instances, each running on a node of the cluster. The HA manager instance on each node communicates with the HA manager instances of the other nodes via CDB updates to ensure that the I/O resources are mounted (i.e., available) during a failover in the cluster. For example, each HA manager instance may make changes to the I/O resource table based on locally-processed events, and may react to changes to the table made by the HA manager instances running on other nodes of the cluster. Changes to the I/O resource table provide a mechanism by which the instances of the HA manager on the nodes communicate to thereby operate as the cluster-wide HA manager configured to coordinate failovers of the I/O resources in the cluster.

In an embodiment, the HA manager interacts with various layers of the storage I/O stack to mount and un-mount the I/O resources on one or more nodes of the cluster through the use of well-defined interfaces, e.g., application programming interfaces (APIs). Illustratively, the HA manager may use functions of one or more layers of the storage I/O stack for mount/un-mount requests (e.g., using mount/un-mount APIs). Notably, the layers of storage I/O stack need not be aware of the states of the I/O resources or of any aspect of the HA state of the cluster with respect to such mounting and un-mounting of the resources. That is, the mount/un-mount requests may be processed independent of the state information tracked by the HA manager. As such, the layers need not be aware of the failover relationships established and maintained between the nodes in the cluster by the HA manager, nor need they (the layers) be aware of any aspect of those failover relationships. For example, several layers of the storage I/O stack may log information to NVRAM to protect against data loss on node failure. In order to maintain availability upon node failure, the NVRAM may be synchronously mirrored to one or more partner nodes. Illustratively, management of the NVRAM mirror is transparent to the layers of the storage I/O stack such that only the HA manager may control (e.g., initiate, pause, and keep track of) NVRAM mirroring state via communication with an NVRAM mirroring module of each node.

DESCRIPTION

Storage Cluster

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a plurality of nodes 200 interconnected as a cluster 100 and configured to provide storage service relating to the organization of information on storage devices. The nodes 200 may be interconnected by a cluster interconnect fabric 110 and include functional components that cooperate to provide a distributed storage architecture of the cluster 100, which may be deployed in a storage area network (SAN). As described herein, the components of each node 200 include hardware and software functionality that enable the node to connect to one or more hosts 120 over a computer network 130, as well as to one or more storage arrays 150 of storage devices over a storage interconnect 140, to thereby render the storage service in accordance with the distributed storage architecture.

Each host 120 may be embodied as a general-purpose computer configured to interact with any node 200 in accordance with a client/server model of information delivery. That is, the client (host) may request the services of the node, and the node may return the results of the services requested by the host, by exchanging packets over the network 130. The host may issue packets including file-based access protocols, such as the Network File System (NFS) protocol over the Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP), when accessing information on the node in the form of storage containers such as files and directories. However, in an embodiment, the host 120 illustratively issues packets including block-based access protocols, such as the Small Computer Systems Interface (SCSI) protocol encapsulated over TCP (iSCSI) and SCSI encapsulated over FC (FCP), when accessing information in the form of storage containers such as logical units (LUNs). Notably, any of the nodes 200 may service a request directed to a storage container stored on the cluster 100.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of a node 200 that is illustratively embodied as a storage system having one or more central processing units (CPUs) 210 coupled to a memory 220 via a memory bus 215. The CPU 210 is also coupled to a network adapter 230, storage controllers 240, a cluster interconnect interface 250, and a non-volatile random access memory (NVRAM 280) via a system interconnect 270. The network adapter 230 may include one or more ports adapted to couple the node 200 to the host(s) 120 over computer network 130, which may include point-to-point links, wide area networks, virtual private networks implemented over a public network (Internet) or a local area network. The network adapter 230 thus includes the mechanical, electrical and signaling circuitry needed to connect the node to the network 130, which illustratively embodies an Ethernet or Fibre Channel (FC) network.

The memory 220 may include memory locations that are addressable by the CPU 210 for storing software programs and data structures associated with the embodiments described herein. The CPU 210 may, in turn, include processing elements and/or logic circuitry configured to execute the software programs, such as a storage input/output (I/O) stack 300, and manipulate the data structures. Illustratively, the storage I/O stack 300 may be implemented as a set of user mode processes that may be decomposed into a plurality of threads. An operating system kernel 224, portions of which are typically resident in memory 220 (in-core) and executed by the processing elements (i.e., CPU 210), functionally organizes the node by, inter alia, invoking operations in support of the storage service implemented by the node and, in particular, the storage I/O stack 300. A suitable operating system kernel 224 may include a general-purpose operating system, such as the UNIX® series or Microsoft Windows® series of operating systems, or an operating system with configurable functionality such as microkernels and embedded kernels. However, in an embodiment described herein, the operating system kernel is illustratively the Linux® operating system. It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that other processing and memory means, including various computer readable media, may be used to store and execute program instructions pertaining to the embodiments herein.

Each storage controller 240 cooperates with the storage I/O stack 300 executing on the node 200 to access information requested by the host 120. The information is preferably stored on storage devices such as solid state drives (SSDs) 260, illustratively embodied as flash storage devices, of storage array 150. In an embodiment, the flash storage devices may be based on NAND flash components, e.g., single-layer-cell (SLC) flash, multi-layer-cell (MLC) flash or triple-layer-cell (TLC) flash, although it will be understood to those skilled in the art that other non-volatile, solid-state electronic devices (e.g., drives based on storage class memory components) may be advantageously used with the embodiments described herein. Accordingly, the storage devices may or may not be block-oriented (i.e., accessed as blocks). The storage controller 240 includes one or more ports having I/O interface circuitry that couples to the SSDs 260 over the storage interconnect 140, illustratively embodied as a serial attached SCSI (SAS) topology. Alternatively, other point-to-point I/O interconnect arrangements, such as a conventional serial ATA (SATA) topology or a PCI topology, may be used. The system interconnect 270 may also couple the node 200 to a local service storage device 248, such as an SSD, configured to locally store cluster-related configuration information, e.g., as cluster database (CDB) 244, which may be replicated to the other nodes 200 in the cluster 100.

The cluster interconnect interface 250 may include one or more ports adapted to couple the node 200 to the other node(s) of the cluster 100. In an embodiment, Ethernet may be used as the clustering protocol and interconnect fabric media, although it will be apparent to those skilled in the art that other types of protocols and interconnects, such as Infiniband, may be utilized within the embodiments described herein. The NVRAM 280 may include a back-up battery or other built-in last-state retention capability (e.g., non-volatile semiconductor memory such as storage class memory) that is capable of maintaining data in light of a failure to the node and cluster environment. Illustratively, a portion of the NVRAM 280 may be configured as one or more non-volatile logs (NVLogs 285) configured to temporarily record (“log”) I/O requests, such as write requests, received from the host 120.

Storage I/O Stack

FIG. 3 is a block diagram of the storage I/O stack 300 that may be advantageously used with one or more embodiments described herein. The storage I/O stack 300 includes a plurality of software modules or layers that cooperate with other functional components of the nodes 200 to provide the distributed storage architecture of the cluster 100. In an embodiment, the distributed storage architecture presents an abstraction of a single storage container, i.e., all of the storage arrays 150 of the nodes 200 for the entire cluster 100 organized as one large pool of storage. In other words, the architecture consolidates storage, i.e., the SSDs 260 of the arrays 150, throughout the cluster (retrievable via cluster-wide keys) to enable storage of the LUNs. Both storage capacity and performance may then be subsequently scaled by adding nodes 200 to the cluster 100.

Illustratively, the storage I/O stack 300 includes an administration layer 310, a protocol layer 320, a persistence layer 330, a volume layer 340, an extent store layer 350, a Redundant Array of Independent Disks (RAID) layer 360, a storage layer 365 and a NVRAM 280 (storing NVLogs 285) “layer” interconnected with a messaging kernel 370. The messaging kernel 370 may provide a message-based (or event-based) scheduling model (e.g., asynchronous scheduling) that employs messages as fundamental units of work exchanged (i.e., passed) among the layers. Suitable message-passing mechanisms provided by the messaging kernel to transfer information between the layers of the storage I/O stack 300 may include, e.g., for intra-node communication: i) messages that execute on a pool of threads, ii) messages that execute on a single thread progressing as an operation through the storage I/O stack, iii) messages using an Inter Process Communication (IPC) mechanism, and, e.g., for inter-node communication: messages using a Remote Procedure Call (RPC) mechanism in accordance with a function shipping implementation. Alternatively, the I/O stack may be implemented using a thread-based or stack-based execution model. In one or more embodiments, the messaging kernel 370 allocates processing resources from the operating system kernel 224 to execute the messages. Each storage I/O stack layer may be implemented as one or more instances (i.e., processes) executing one or more threads (e.g., in kernel or user space) that process the messages passed between the layers such that the messages provide synchronization for blocking and non-blocking operation of the layers.

In an embodiment, the protocol layer 320 may communicate with the host 120 over the network 130 by exchanging discrete frames or packets configured as I/O requests according to pre-defined protocols, such as iSCSI and FCP. An I/O request, e.g., a read or write request, may be directed to a LUN and may include I/O parameters such as, inter alia, a LUN identifier (ID), a logical block address (LBA) of the LUN, a length (i.e., amount of data) and, in the case of a write request, write data. The protocol layer 320 receives the I/O request and forwards it to the persistence layer 330, which records the request into a persistent write-back cache 380 illustratively embodied as a log whose contents can be replaced randomly, e.g., under some random access replacement policy rather than only in serial fashion, and returns an acknowledgement to the host 120 via the protocol layer 320. In an embodiment only I/O requests that modify the LUN, e.g., write requests, are logged. Notably, the I/O request may be logged at the node receiving the I/O request, or in an alternative embodiment in accordance with the function shipping implementation, the I/O request may be logged at another node.

Illustratively, dedicated logs may be maintained by the various layers of the storage I/O stack 300. For example, a dedicated log 335 may be maintained by the persistence layer 330 to record the I/O parameters of an I/O request as equivalent internal, i.e., storage I/O stack, parameters, e.g., volume ID, offset, and length. In the case of a write request, the persistence layer 330 may also cooperate with the NVRAM 280 to implement the write-back cache 380 configured to store the write data associated with the write request. In an embodiment, the write-back cache may be structured as a log. Notably, the write data for the write request may be physically stored in the cache 380 such that the log 335 contains the reference to the associated write data. It will be understood to persons skilled in the art that other variations of data structures may be used to store or maintain the write data in NVRAM including data structures with no logs. In an embodiment, a copy of the write-back cache may be also maintained in the memory 220 to facilitate direct memory access to the storage controllers. In other embodiments, caching may be performed at the host 120 or at a receiving node in accordance with a protocol that maintains coherency between the data stored at the cache and the cluster.

In an embodiment, the administration layer 310 may apportion the LUN into multiple volumes, each of which may be partitioned into multiple regions (e.g., allotted as disjoint block address ranges), with each region having one or more segments stored as multiple stripes on the array 150. A plurality of volumes distributed among the nodes 200 may thus service a single LUN, i.e., each volume within the LUN services a different LBA range (i.e., offset range and length, hereinafter offset range) or set of ranges within the LUN. Accordingly, the protocol layer 320 may implement a volume mapping technique to identify a volume to which the I/O request is directed (i.e., the volume servicing the offset range indicated by the parameters of the I/O request). Illustratively, the cluster database 244 may be configured to maintain one or more associations (e.g., key-value pairs) for each of the multiple volumes, e.g., an association between the LUN ID and a volume, as well as an association between the volume and a node ID for a node managing the volume. The administration layer 310 may also cooperate with the database 244 to create (or delete) one or more volumes associated with the LUN (e.g., creating a volume ID/LUN key-value pair in the database 244). Using the LUN ID and LBA (or LBA range), the volume mapping technique may provide a volume ID (e.g., using appropriate associations in the cluster database 244) that identifies the volume and node servicing the volume destined for the request as well as translate the LBA (or LBA range) into an offset and length within the volume. Specifically, the volume ID is used to determine a volume layer instance that manages volume metadata associated with the LBA or LBA range. As noted, the protocol layer 320 may pass the I/O request (i.e., volume ID, offset and length) to the persistence layer 330, which may use the function shipping (e.g., inter-node) implementation to forward the I/O request to the appropriate volume layer instance executing on a node in the cluster based on the volume ID.

In an embodiment, the volume layer 340 may manage the volume metadata by, e.g., maintaining states of host-visible containers, such as ranges of LUNs, and performing data management functions, such as creation of snapshots and clones, for the LUNs in cooperation with the administration layer 310. The volume metadata is illustratively embodied as in-core mappings from LUN addresses (i.e., offsets) to durable extent keys, which are unique cluster-wide IDs associated with SSD storage locations for extents within an extent key space of the cluster-wide storage container. That is, an extent key may be used to retrieve the data of the extent at a SSD storage location associated with the extent key. Alternatively, there may be multiple storage containers in the cluster wherein each container has its own extent key space, e.g., where the administration layer 310 provides distribution of extents among the storage containers. An extent is a variable length block of data that provides a unit of storage on the SSDs and that need not be aligned on any specific boundary, i.e., it may be byte aligned. Accordingly, an extent may be an aggregation of write data from a plurality of write requests to maintain such alignment. Illustratively, the volume layer 340 may record the forwarded request (e.g., information or parameters characterizing the request), as well as changes to the volume metadata, in dedicated log 345 maintained by the volume layer 340. Subsequently, the contents of the volume layer log 345 may be written to the storage array 150 in accordance with a checkpoint (e.g., synchronization) operation that stores in-core metadata on the array 150. That is, the checkpoint operation (checkpoint) ensures that a consistent state of metadata, as processed in-core, is committed to (i.e., stored on) the storage array 150; whereas retirement of log entries ensures that the entries accumulated in the volume layer log 345 synchronize with the metadata checkpoints committed to the storage array 150 by, e.g., retiring those accumulated log entries stored prior to the recorded checkpoint. In one or more embodiments, the checkpoint and retirement of log entries may be data driven, periodic or both.

In an embodiment, the extent store layer 350 is responsible for storing extents on the SSDs 260 (i.e., on the storage array 150) and for providing the extent keys to the volume layer 340 (e.g., in response to a forwarded write request). The extent store layer 350 is also responsible for retrieving data (e.g., an existing extent) using an extent key (e.g., in response to a forwarded read request). The extent store layer 350 may be responsible for performing de-duplication and compression on the extents prior to storage. The extent store layer 350 may maintain in-core mappings (e.g., embodied as hash tables) of extent keys to SSD storage locations (e.g., offset on an SSD 260 of array 150). The extent store layer 350 may also maintain a dedicated log 355 of entries that accumulate requested “put” and “delete” operations (i.e., write requests and delete requests for extents issued from other layers to the extent store layer 350), where these operations change the in-core mappings (i.e., hash table entries). Subsequently, the in-core mappings and contents of the extent store layer log 355 may be written to the storage array 150 in accordance with a “fuzzy” checkpoint 390 (i.e., checkpoint with incremental changes recorded in one or more log files) in which selected in-core mappings (less than the total), are committed to the array 150 at various intervals (e.g., driven by an amount of change to the in-core mappings, size thresholds of log 355, or periodically). Notably, the accumulated entries in log 355 may be retired once all in-core mappings have been committed to include the changes recorded in those entries.

In an embodiment, the RAID layer 360 may organize the SSDs 260 within the storage array 150 as one or more RAID groups (e.g., sets of SSDs) that enhance the reliability and integrity of extent storage on the array by writing data “stripes” having redundant information, i.e., appropriate parity information with respect to the striped data, across a given number of SSDs 260 of each RAID group. The RAID layer 360 may also store a number of stripes (e.g., stripes of sufficient depth), e.g., in accordance with a plurality of contiguous range write operations, so as to reduce data relocation (i.e., internal flash block management) that may occur within the SSDs as a result of the operations. In an embodiment, the storage layer 365 implements storage I/O drivers that may communicate directly with hardware (e.g., the storage controllers and cluster interface) cooperating with the operating system kernel 224, such as a Linux virtual function I/O (VFIO) driver.

Write Path

FIG. 4 illustrates an I/O (e.g., write) path 400 of the storage I/O stack 300 for processing an I/O request, e.g., a SCSI write request 410. The write request 410 may be issued by host 120 and directed to a LUN stored on the storage arrays 150 of the cluster 100. Illustratively, the protocol layer 320 receives and processes the write request by decoding 420 (e.g., parsing and extracting) fields of the request, e.g., LUN ID, LBA and length (shown at 413), as well as write data 414. The protocol layer 320 may use the results 422 from decoding 420 for a volume mapping technique 430 (described above) that translates the LUN ID and LBA range (i.e., equivalent offset and length) of the write request to an appropriate volume layer instance, i.e., volume ID (volume 445), in the cluster 100 that is responsible for managing volume metadata for the LBA range. In an alternative embodiment, the persistence layer 330 may implement the above described volume mapping technique 430. The protocol layer then passes the results 432, e.g., volume ID, offset, length (as well as write data), to the persistence layer 330, which records the request in the persistence layer log 335 and returns an acknowledgement to the host 120 via the protocol layer 320. The persistence layer 330 may aggregate and organize write data 414 from one or more write requests into a new extent 470 and perform a hash computation, i.e., a hash function, on the new extent to generate a hash value 472 in accordance with an extent hashing technique 474.

The persistence layer 330 may then pass the write request with aggregated write data including, e.g., the volume ID, offset and length, as parameters 434 to the appropriate volume layer instance. In an embodiment, message passing of the parameters 434 (received by the persistence layer) may be redirected to another node via the function shipping mechanism, e.g., RPC, for inter-node communication. Alternatively, message passing of the parameters 434 may be via the IPC mechanism, e.g., message threads, for intra-node communication.

In one or more embodiments, a bucket mapping technique 476 is provided that translates the hash value 472 to an instance of an appropriate extent store layer (i.e., extent store instance 478) that is responsible for storing the new extent 470. Note, the bucket mapping technique may be implemented in any layer of the storage I/O stack above the extent store layer. In an embodiment, for example, the bucket mapping technique may be implemented in the persistence layer 330, the volume layer 340, or a layer that manages cluster-wide information, such as a cluster layer (not shown). Accordingly, the persistence layer 330, the volume layer 340, or the cluster layer may contain computer executable instructions executed by the CPU 210 to perform operations that implement the bucket mapping technique 476 described herein. The persistence layer 330 may then pass the hash value 472 and the new extent 470 to the appropriate volume layer instance and onto the appropriate extent store instance via an extent store put operation. The extent hashing technique 474 may embody an approximately uniform hash function to ensure that any random extent to be written may have an approximately equal chance of falling into any extent store instance 478, i.e., hash buckets are distributed across extent store instances of the cluster 100 based on available resources. As a result, the bucket mapping technique 476 provides load-balancing of write operations (and, by symmetry, read operations) across nodes 200 of the cluster, while also leveling flash wear in the SSDs 260 of the cluster.

In response to the put operation, the extent store instance may process the hash value 472 to perform an extent metadata selection technique 460 that (i) selects an appropriate hash table 482 (e.g., hash table 482 a) from a set of hash tables (illustratively in-core) within the extent store instance 470, and (ii) extracts a hash table index 484 from the hash value 472 to index into the selected hash table and lookup a table entry having an extent key 475 identifying a storage location 490 on SSD 260 for the extent. Accordingly, the extent store layer 350 contains computer executable instructions executed by the CPU 210 to perform operations that implement the extent metadata selection technique 480 described herein. If a table entry with a matching extent key is found, then the SSD location 490 mapped from the extent key 475 is used to retrieve an existing extent (not shown) from SSD. The existing extent is then compared with the new extent 470 to determine whether their data is identical. If the data is identical, the new extent 470 is already stored on SSD 260 and a de-duplication opportunity (denoted de-duplication 452) exists such that there is no need to write another copy of the data. Accordingly, a reference count in the table entry for the existing extent is incremented and the extent key 475 of the existing extent is passed to the appropriate volume layer instance for storage within an entry (denoted as volume metadata entry 446) of a dense tree metadata structure 444 (e.g., dense tree 444 a), such that the extent key 475 is associated an offset range 440 (e.g., offset range 440 a) of the volume 445.

However, if the data of the existing extent is not identical to the data of the new extent 470, a collision occurs and a deterministic algorithm is invoked to sequentially generate as many new candidate extent keys (not shown) mapping to the same bucket as needed to either provide de-duplication 452 or to produce an extent key that is not already stored within the extent store instance. Notably, another hash table (e.g. hash table 482 n) may be selected by a new candidate extent key in accordance with the extent metadata selection technique 480. In the event that no de-duplication opportunity exists (i.e., the extent is not already stored) the new extent 470 is compressed in accordance with compression technique 454 and passed to the RAID layer 360, which processes the new extent 470 for storage on SSD 260 within one or more stripes 464 of RAID group 466. The extent store instance may cooperate with the RAID layer 360 to identify a storage segment 460 (i.e., a portion of the storage array 150) and a location on SSD 260 within the segment 460 in which to store the new extent 470. Illustratively, the identified storage segment is a segment with a large contiguous free space having, e.g., location 490 on SSD 260 b for storing the extent 470.

In an embodiment, the RAID layer 360 then writes the stripes 464 across the RAID group 466, illustratively as one or more full stripe writes 462. The RAID layer 360 may write a series of stripes 464 of sufficient depth to reduce data relocation that may occur within the flash-based SSDs 260 (i.e., flash block management). The extent store instance then (i) loads the SSD location 490 of the new extent 470 into the selected hash table 482 n (i.e., as selected by the new candidate extent key), (ii) passes a new extent key (denoted as extent key 475) to the appropriate volume layer instance for storage within an entry (also denoted as volume metadata entry 446) of a dense tree 444 managed by that volume layer instance, and (iii) records a change to extent metadata of the selected hash table in the extent store layer log 355. Illustratively, the volume layer instance selects dense tree 444 a spanning an offset range 440 a of the volume 445 that encompasses the offset range of the write request. As noted, the volume 445 (e.g., an offset space of the volume) is partitioned into multiple regions (e.g., allotted as disjoint offset ranges); in an embodiment, each region is represented by a dense tree 444. The volume layer instance then inserts the volume metadata entry 446 into the dense tree 444 a and records a change corresponding to the volume metadata entry in the volume layer log 345. Accordingly, the I/O (write) request is sufficiently stored on SSD 260 of the cluster.

Read Path

FIG. 5 illustrates an I/O (e.g., read) path 500 of the storage I/O stack 300 for processing an I/O request, e.g., a SCSI read request 510. The read request 510 may be issued by host 120 and received at the protocol layer 320 of a node 200 in the cluster 100. Illustratively, the protocol layer 320 processes the read request by decoding 420 (e.g., parsing and extracting) fields of the request, e.g., LUN ID, LBA, and length (shown at 513), and uses the decoded results 522, e.g., LUN ID, offset, and length, for the volume mapping technique 430. That is, the protocol layer 320 may implement the volume mapping technique 430 (described above) to translate the LUN ID and LBA range (i.e., equivalent offset and length) of the read request to an appropriate volume layer instance, i.e., volume ID (volume 445), in the cluster 100 that is responsible for managing volume metadata for the LBA (i.e., offset) range. The protocol layer then passes the results 532 to the persistence layer 330, which may search the write-back cache 380 to determine whether some or all of the read request can be serviced from its cached data. If the entire request cannot be serviced from the cached data, the persistence layer 330 may then pass the remaining portion of the request including, e.g., the volume ID, offset and length, as parameters 534 to the appropriate volume layer instance in accordance with the function shipping mechanism (e.g., RPC, for inter-node communication) or the IPC mechanism (e.g., message threads, for intra-node communication).

The volume layer instance may process the read request to access a dense tree metadata structure 444 (e.g., dense tree 444 a) associated with a region (e.g., offset range 440 a) of a volume 445 that encompasses the requested offset range (specified by parameters 534). The volume layer instance may further process the read request to search for (lookup) one or more volume metadata entries 446 of the dense tree 444 a to obtain one or more extent keys 475 associated with one or more extents 470 (or portions of extents) within the requested offset range. In an embodiment, each dense tree 444 may be embodied as multiple levels of a search structure with possibly overlapping offset range entries at each level. The various levels of the dense tree may have volume metadata entries 446 for the same offset, in which case, the higher level has the newer entry and is used to service the read request. A top level of the dense tree 444 is illustratively resident in-core and a page cache 448 may be used to access lower levels of the tree. If the requested range or portion thereof is not present in the top level, a metadata page associated with an index entry at the next lower tree level (not shown) is accessed. The metadata page (i.e., in the page cache 448) at the next level is then searched to find any overlapping entries. This process is then iterated until one or more volume metadata entries 446 of a level are found to ensure that the extent key(s) 475 for the entire requested read range are found. If no metadata entries exist for the entire or portions of the requested range, then the missing portion(s) are zero filled.

Once found, each extent key 475 is processed by the volume layer 340 to, e.g., implement the bucket mapping technique 476 that translates the extent key to an appropriate extent store instance 478 responsible for storing the requested extent 470. Note that, in an embodiment, each extent key 475 may be substantially identical to the hash value 472 associated with the extent 470, i.e., the hash value as calculated during the write request for the extent, such that the bucket mapping 476 and extent metadata selection 480 techniques may be used for both write and read path operations. Note also that the extent key 475 may be derived from the hash value 472. The volume layer 340 may then pass the extent key 475 (i.e., the hash value from a previous write request for the extent) to the appropriate extent store instance 478 (via an extent store get operation), which performs an extent key-to-SSD mapping to determine the location on SSD 260 for the extent.

In response to the get operation, the extent store instance may process the extent key 475 (i.e., hash value 472) to perform the extent metadata selection technique 480 that (i) selects an appropriate hash table 482 (e.g., hash table 482 a) from a set of hash tables within the extent store instance 478, and (ii) extracts a hash table index 484 from the extent key 475 (i.e., hash value 472) to index into the selected hash table and lookup a table entry having a matching extent key 475 that identifies a storage location 490 on SSD 260 for the extent 470. That is, the SSD location 490 mapped to the extent key 475 may be used to retrieve the existing extent (denoted as extent 470) from SSD 260 (e.g., SSD 260 b). The extent store instance then cooperates with the RAID layer 360 to access the extent on SSD 260 b and retrieve the data contents in accordance with the read request. Illustratively, the RAID layer 360 may read the extent in accordance with an extent read operation 468 and pass the extent 470 to the extent store instance. The extent store instance may then decompress the extent 470 in accordance with a decompression technique 456, although it will be understood to those skilled in the art that decompression can be performed at any layer of the storage I/O stack 300. The extent 470 may be stored in a buffer (not shown) in memory 220 and a reference to that buffer may be passed back through the layers of the storage I/O stack. The persistence layer may then load the extent into a read cache 580 (or other staging mechanism) and may extract appropriate read data 512 from the read cache 580 for the LBA range of the read request 510. Thereafter, the protocol layer 320 may create a SCSI read response 514, including the read data 512, and return the read response to the host 120.

High Data Availability

In an embodiment, two or more nodes 200 of the cluster may be configured to provide failover protection to each other in the event of a failure to one or more of the nodes. In order to implement such failover protection, the nodes 200 may communicate among themselves across one or more communication links, such as the cluster interconnect 110, to establish a HA partner arrangement. Each node 200 may maintain information relating to status of hardware and software associated with the node, as well as status of data access requests (operations) serviced and logged (e.g., NVlog 335) by the node. Illustratively, the status of the logged operations may indicate that the operations have not yet been committed (i.e., persistently stored) to the storage devices (e.g., SSDs 260) of the cluster. The information is illustratively maintained in the NVRAM 280 of the node (i.e., the local node servicing the I/O requests) and, to guarantee high data availability, copied (mirrored) over an HA interconnect 610 to the NVRAM of a partner node associated with the local node in accordance with an established HA partner arrangement so as to synchronize the information between the local and partner nodes. Note that in other embodiments such synchronization may occur among three or more nodes.

FIG. 6 illustrates an HA partner arrangement 600 that facilitates high data availability in a multi-node cluster. The NVRAM 280 a,b of each node is illustratively organized into two portions. A first portion (i.e., the “LOCAL” portion) of the NVRAM may store information about the hardware and software, including logged operations, of the local node, and a second portion (i.e., the “PARTNER” portion) of the NVRAM may store similar, mirrored information associated with its partner node. For example, assume the operations include data access requests, such as write requests. The local node (e.g., node 200 a) may receive and execute (i.e., process) the operations and then record (i.e., log) the operations to the LOCAL portion of the NVRAM 280 a prior to committing the processed operations to persistent storage (e.g., SSD 260). Thereafter, the local node 200 a may mirror the operations over the HA interconnect 610 to the PARTNER portion of the NVRAM 280 b on its partner node (e.g., node 200 b) to synchronize the local and partner nodes with respect to the mirrored operations. In response to a failure of the local node, the partner node may initiate a failover that essentially takes over the storage service(s) provided by the local node. Note that acknowledgement of data access (write) requests to the host occurs after logging associated information to both the LOCAL portion of the NVRAM 280 a and the PARTNER portion of the NVRAM 280 b. As such, failover capability may be disabled if logging to the PARTNER portion of the NVRAM 280 b fails. During failover of services of the local node to the partner node, various software components (e.g., layers) of the nodes may interoperate (i.e., interact) to efficiently coordinate the failover. As such, it is desirable that these software components are modular and interact using well-defined interfaces.

High Availability Manager

The embodiments herein provide a high availability (HA) failover manager configured to maintain data availability of I/O resources in the cluster by ensuring that each I/O resource is mounted (i.e., available) on a hosting node of the cluster and that each I/O resource may be mounted on one or more partner nodes of the cluster in the event of a node (i.e., a local node) failure. FIG. 7 is a block diagram of a high data availability arrangement 700 including the HA failover manager that may be advantageously used with one or more embodiments described herein. The HA failover manager (HA manager 710) is illustratively a cluster-wide component (e.g., software module) that includes a plurality of instances, each running on a node of the cluster. The HA manager 710 is illustratively a high-level construct disposed above a cluster consensus manager 720 and residing outside of the storage I/O stack 300 as a separate service responsible for coordinating HA state and failover actions in the cluster so as to keep as much of the I/O resources of the stack available (e.g., mounted) as possible. As used herein, an I/O resource 730 includes one or more volumes 445 and/or extent stores 740 of the storage I/O stack 300, wherein an extent store 740 may be viewed as a global pool of extents stored on the storage arrays 150 of the cluster 100 and embodied as a storage container stored on one or more SSDs 260 of the storage arrays.

The HA manager 710 is illustratively embodied as a state machine configured to process inputs from various sources of the cluster to determine whether failover is enabled for the local node and each partner node in an HA group, and for triggering failover of the I/O resources to the partner node as necessary. The inputs may include a cluster node state (booting, shutdown, or failure) via CDB 244, a state of storage connectivity to the storage array 150, and a state of NVRAM mirroring (via NVRAM mirroring module 750). The HA manager 710 interfaces with the NVRAM mirroring module 750 to establish and implement policies, such as (i) where (i.e., to which node) the NVRAM 280 is mirrored and (ii) whether the NVRAM mirror is in sync (or not). Illustratively, for a 2-node cluster, the HA manager mirrors all NVRAM information to its partner node and ensures that the I/O resources 730 may be mounted (i.e., be available) on the partner node. For a larger cluster configuration, the HA manager may process and analyze heuristics to determine (i) which I/O resource(s) 730 may failover to which node(s), and (ii) the most efficient way to setup and configure NVRAM mirroring so as to efficiently use network links, e.g., avoid overwhelming some network links while others are idle.

For each I/O resource, the HA manager 710 may track state information including (i) a state of the I/O resource (e.g., mounted or un-mounted); (ii) the partner node(s) ability to mount (i.e., capability to service) the I/O resource; and (iii) whether NVRAM 280 is synchronized to the partner node(s) (i.e., whether the mirror is up to date). The state information may be stored in an I/O resource table 760 of the CDB 244 that is maintained by the cluster consensus manager 720 and provides transaction semantics that guarantee ordering and consistency across the nodes of the cluster. The HA manager instance on each node communicates with the HA manager instances of the other nodes via CDB updates to ensure that the I/O resources 730 are mounted during node failures in the cluster 100. For example, each HA manager instance may make changes to the I/O resource table 760 based on locally-processed events, and may react to changes to the table made by the HA manager instances running on other nodes of the cluster. Changes to the I/O resource table provide a mechanism by which the instances of the HA manager on the nodes communicate to thereby operate as the cluster-wide HA manager 710 configured to coordinate failovers of the I/O resources 730 in the cluster.

Specifically, the HA manager 710 leverages the CDB 244 and the cluster consensus manager 720 (e.g., via a consensus protocol RAFT) to maintain information (e.g., node up/down) and states of the I/O resources 730 which failover from one node to another within the cluster 100. The states of the I/O resources 730 may include, e.g., the node(s) in the cluster that are capable to mount the resource at a particular point in time based when the NVRAM is synchronized (i.e., mirror is up to date). As such, the HA manager 710 drives HA events through changes to states of the I/O resources 730 as stored in the I/O resource table 760, as well to updates of the CDB 244. Notably, the layers of the storage I/O stack 300 may have no (i.e., need not have) knowledge of HA or NVRAM mirroring. Accordingly, the layers are merely instructed, e.g., via an operation, to mount or un-mount the I/O resources 730 and the HA manager 710 assumes control of all other aspects of HA.

For example, in response to a (local) node failure event, the HA manager 710 on a surviving (partner) node receives notification from the CDB 244 of the event and determines whether there are I/O resources 730 that may be affected by the event. Alternatively, a cluster manager (not shown) may receive notification of the event from the CDB 244 and relay such notification to the HA manager 710, which determines whether there are I/O resources 730 that may be affected by the event. The HA manager 710 may scan its local I/O resource table 760 of the CDB 244 to determine which (if any) I/O resource was mounted (available) on the failed local node and also to determine whether its NVRAM mirror is synchronized (i.e., up to date). For an HA pair configuration, the other node is the partner node, whereas for a multi-node HA group configuration, there may be multiple nodes eligible to mount the resource(s). For instance, assume that the failed local node of a 4-node HA group fully mirrored its NVRAM 280 to the three other node members; accordingly, any one of the three surviving nodes may be capable to mount the resource(s). However, only one surviving node may takeover operations of the failed node. As such, one of the surviving nodes would “win” a race (e.g., a race condition handled by the CDB 244) to become the partner node. That is, all surviving nodes may attempt to mount the resource(s) but only one node may become the partner node by updating the I/O resource table 760 to, e.g., a state indicating that the resource(s) is mounted on the node.

In an embodiment, the CDB (via a CDB manager) may send notifications (e.g., callback messages) to the various HA manager instances on the nodes of the cluster; based on the callbacks, each HA manager may decide which I/O resource(s) to mount (or un-mount) in order to maintain availability in the cluster. Any software component (e.g., layer of storage I/O stack or separate manager/module) of the node may register for updates to table(s) in the CDB 244 so that the component may be notified when changes to the table(s) occur. For example, the HA manager 710 may register for callbacks to updates on the I/O resource table 760 such that the CDB 244 sends notifications when the updates (changes) occur. The HA manager 710 may then decide how to manage I/O resources 730 (e.g., volume 445 and extent store 740) for availability. Accordingly, the CDB notifications enable reliable distribution of information across the nodes of the cluster. The CDB tables are illustratively resident in memory 220 (in-core) such that read operations to the tables are fast and efficient. However updates (i.e., changes visible throughout the cluster) to the CDB tables require synchronization across the nodes (i.e., updates throughout the cluster to the local service storage device, which may be time consuming). To verify that a table has changed, a component (such as the HA manager) may read the contents of the table, a copy of which is resident in-core on the HA manager's local node.

In an embodiment, a cluster membership manager (CMM) 770 of each node sends periodic signals (e.g., heartbeats) to the CMMs of the other nodes in the cluster. Illustratively, the CMM 770 of each node expects to receive a heartbeat from all the other nodes in the cluster such that if a heartbeat is not received from each other node within a determined period, the CMM may declare any non-responding node as failed and update the CDB 244, which may trigger change notifications across the cluster that indicate the I/O resources serviced by the non-responding node as failed.

In an embodiment, the HA manager 710 interacts with various layers of the storage I/O stack 300 to mount and un-mount the I/O resources 730 on one or more nodes of the cluster through the use of well-defined interfaces, e.g., application programming interfaces (APIs). Illustratively, the HA manager 710 may use functions provided by one or more layers for mount/un-mount requests using mount/un-mount APIs of the storage I/O stack 300. Notably, the layers of storage I/O stack need not be aware of the states of the I/O resources or of any aspect of the HA state of the cluster with respect to such mounting and un-mounting of the resources. That is, mount/unmount requests processed by the layers are independent of the state information tracked by the HA manager. As such, the layers need not be aware of the failover relationships established and maintained between the nodes in the cluster by the HA manager, nor need they (the layers) be aware of any aspect of those failover relationships. As noted, several layers of the storage I/O stack may log information to NVRAM 280 to protect against data loss on node failure. In order to maintain availability upon node failure, the NVRAM 280 may be synchronously mirrored to one or more partner nodes. Management of the NVRAM mirror is transparent to the layers of the storage I/O stack such that only the HA manager may control (e.g., initiate, pause, and keep track of) NVRAM mirroring state via communication with a NVRAM mirroring module of each node.

In an embodiment, one or more resource identifiers (IDs) associated with one or more I/O resources being mounted or unmounted may be passed through one or more layers of the storage I/O stack. Illustratively, each layer of the storage I/O stack may associate a resource ID with a different type of resource, e.g., the volume layer may associate a first resource ID with the volume 445 and the extent store layer may associate a second resource ID with the extent store 740. As such, each layer of the storage I/O stack may manage a separate portion of the I/O resource table 760 stored in the CDB, wherein the respective separate portion of the table stores the association of the resource ID with the resource. Further, the resource ID may be recorded in the NVlogs (e.g., in headers of NVRAM logs) which are associated with the respective resource identified by the resource ID. Accordingly, during failover only those logs identified as associated with a failed resource need be replayed.

The foregoing description has been directed to specific embodiments. It will be apparent, however, that other variations and modifications may be made to the described embodiments, with the attainment of some or all of their advantages. For instance, it is expressly contemplated that the components and/or elements described herein can be implemented as software encoded on a tangible (non-transitory) computer-readable medium (e.g., disks, electronic memory, and/or CDs) having program instructions executing on a computer, hardware, firmware, or a combination thereof. Accordingly this description is to be taken only by way of example and not to otherwise limit the scope of the embodiments herein. Therefore, it is the object of the appended claims to cover all such variations and modifications as come within the true spirit and scope of the embodiments herein. 

What is claimed is:
 1. A system comprising: a plurality of nodes interconnected as a high availability (HA) group of a cluster, each node including a central processing unit (CPU) coupled to a storage array, a service storage device, a non-volatile random access memory (NVRAM) and a memory; the service storage device configured to store cluster-related configuration information as a cluster database (CDB); the NVRAM configured to maintain status information of data access requests serviced by the node, the status information indicating whether the corresponding data access request is persistently stored on the storage array, the status information stored in one or more non-volatile logs of the NVRAM, the status information mirrored over a HA interconnect connecting a local node of the HA group to a partner node to of the HA group to synchronize the status information between the nodes; and the memory configured to store a high availability (HA) failover manager executable by the CPU, the HA failover manager configured to maintain data availability of input/output (I/O) resources in the cluster by ensuring that each I/O resource is mounted on at least one of the local node and the partner node.
 2. The system of claim 1 wherein each I/O resource includes one of a volume and extent store of a storage I/O stack stored in the memory and executable by the CPU.
 3. The system of claim 1 wherein the HA failover manager is embodied as a state machine configured to process inputs from the cluster to (i) determine whether failover is enabled for the local node and the partner node of the HA group and (ii) trigger the failover of the I/O resources from the local node to the partner node.
 4. The system of claim 3 wherein the inputs include a cluster node state via the CDB.
 5. The system of claim 4 wherein the cluster node state comprises one of booting, shutdown and failure.
 6. The system of claim 3 wherein the inputs include a state of storage connectivity to the storage array.
 7. The system of claim 3 wherein the inputs include a state of NVRAM mirroring via a NVRAM mirroring module executable by the CPU.
 8. The system of claim 7 wherein the HA failover manager interfaces with the NVRAM mirroring module to establish and implement policies including whether the mirrored status information is synchronized between the nodes.
 9. The system of claim 1 further comprising an I/O resource table of the CDB configured to store state information and provide semantics for ordering and consistency of transactions across the nodes of the cluster.
 10. The system of claim 9 wherein the state information includes (i) a state of each I/O resource, (ii) an ability of the partner node to mount each I/O resource, and (iii) synchronization of the NVRAM on the local and partner nodes.
 11. The system of claim 9 wherein the HA failover manager is a cluster-wide component that includes a plurality of HA manager instances, and wherein each HA manger instance runs on a node of the cluster.
 12. The system of claim 11 wherein in response to a first HA manager instance changing the state information of the I/O resource table, a second HA manager instance reacts to the changed state information to enable communication among the HA manager instances.
 13. The system of claim 11 further comprising a CDB manager of the CDB configured to send CDB notifications to the plurality of HA manager instances in response to changes to the state information of the I/O resource table.
 14. A method comprising: interconnecting a plurality of nodes as a high availability (HA) group of a cluster, wherein each node includes a central processing unit (CPU) coupled to a storage array, a service storage device, a non-volatile random access memory (NVRAM) and a memory; storing cluster-related configuration information as a cluster database (CDB) on the service storage device; maintaining status information of data access requests serviced by the node on one or more non-volatile logs of the NVRAM, the status information indicating whether the corresponding data access request is persistently stored on the storage array; mirroring the status information over a HA interconnect connecting a local node of the HA group to a partner node to of the HA group to synchronize the status information between the nodes; and implementing a high availability (HA) failover manager to maintain data availability of input/output (I/O) resources in the cluster and ensure that each I/O resource is mounted on at least one of the local node and the partner node.
 15. The method of claim 14 wherein each I/O resource includes one of a volume and extent store of a storage I/O stack executable by the CPU.
 16. The method of claim 14 wherein implementing the HA failover manager further comprises: embodying the HA failover manager as a state machine configured to process inputs from the cluster to (i) determine whether failover is enabled for the local node and the partner node of the HA group and (ii) trigger the failover of the I/O resources from the local node to the partner node.
 17. The method of claim 16 wherein the inputs include a cluster node state via the CDB.
 18. The method of claim 16 wherein the inputs include a state of storage connectivity to the storage array.
 19. The method of claim 16 wherein the inputs include a state of NVRAM mirroring via a NVRAM mirroring module.
 20. A non-transitory computer readable media containing instructions for execution on a processor for a method comprising: interconnecting a plurality of nodes as a high availability (HA) group of a cluster, wherein each node includes a central processing unit (CPU) coupled to a storage array, a service storage device, a non-volatile random access memory (NVRAM) and a memory; storing cluster-related configuration information as a cluster database (CDB) on the service storage device; maintaining status information of data access requests serviced by the node on one or more non-volatile logs of the NVRAM, the status information indicating whether the corresponding data access request is persistently stored on the storage array; mirroring the status information over a HA interconnect connecting a local node of the HA group to a partner node to of the HA group to synchronize the status information between the nodes; and implementing a high availability (HA) failover manager to maintain data availability of input/output (I/O) resources in the cluster and ensure that each I/O resource is mounted on at least one of the local node and the partner node. 